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REVIEW: Far Cry 6 (PS5) — To Rebuild a Paradise

 

 
Overview
 

Published by: Ubisoft
 
Developed by: Ubisoft Toronto
 
Platform(s): PS4/5, Xbox One/Series, PC, Stadia
 
Genre(s): First-person, Open-world sandbox
 
Mode(s): Singleplayer, Multiplayer
 
Game Type: , ,
 
FG RATING
85%
85/ 100


User Rating
1 total rating

 

Raves


Giancarlo Esposito. The rest of the cast is great. Fast travel via airdrop. A fun to explore, massive and gorgeous sandbox. Emphasis on loadouts is a good direction. Co-op is fun and better incentivized. Supremos are fun.

Rants


Anton Castillo's character is predictable. Some archaic open-world elements. Emphasis on loadouts can still be bypassed.


0
Posted October 6, 2021 by

Ever since Far Cry 3, the series kept introducing more memorable villains with each iteration. None of which came quite close to the impact Vaas Montenegro has had in the series.

Far Cry 6 will be the series’ first official entry to the latest generation and, with a big name as Giancarlo Esposito to play the villain, it’s also the most ambitious. The game certainly has some big shoes to fill. So the question is, does the boot fit?

Truth or Lie?

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The game takes place in Yara, a beautiful island paradise traumatized by numerous revolutions over the centuries. Elected president Antón Castillo promises to return the island to its former glory. Key to his movement is the Viviro, a cancer-curing drug derived from tobacco only found in Yara with pharmaceuticals willing to pay top dollar to get their hands on it. Unfortunately, the process of producing the drug comes at the cost of innocent lives. People he dubs as “Fake Yarans”, who are basically anyone even remotely against his regime and are enslaved to work the toxic fields to death.

You play as Dani Rojas, who, on her way out of the country, survives a horrific attack on her boat killing her friends and other refugees. After an encounter with the leader of a revolutionary movement and a former spy, she learns that running away isn’t the only path to freedom. Like pretty much all the recent Ubisoft games, the protagonist can either be male or female and both are considered canon. Normally, I’m not a fan of this kind of design ’cause it’s likely to cause some possible limitations to character development, but it hasn’t been the case so far and it isn’t for Far Cry 6 either. Furthermore, unlike previous games in the series, this time the protagonist seems to be more involved in cutscenes and you even get to see your character in the third person.

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Far Cry has always highlighted its villains, so the elephant in the room, of course, is Giancarlo Esposito and his role as the game’s main bad guy. Right out of the bad I can tell you that Giancarlo’s performance is exceptional, diluted only by the character he’s playing, who, despite being an empathic gray area of a character, still ends up predictable and feeling a little bit uninspired. Not at all bad, you’d just expect more considering the talent involved. What’s surprising, however, is the fact that nearly all the other cast members are just as good, making the entire story worthwhile despite certain elements being a bit more lackluster than I would’ve liked.

The Right Tool The Right Job

In Far Cry 6, you start with nothing as you build your way up the Guerilla food chain. Doing guerilla stuff like liberating checkpoints, stealing supplies, and taking out anti-air emplacements, you’ll start to build your reputation, unlocking better quality gear and weaponry.

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At its core, the game feels and plays like Far Cry, but one stand-out change is the emphasis on gear loadout. Skill trees are no longer a thing, instead, you’ll need to mix and match equipment sets with unique effects to suit your playstyle. The same goes with guns, as certain enemy types are more vulnerable to certain types of ammunition. Modifying your gun mods and equipped gear based on your most immediate objective will be key. This is interesting because you can still be the absolute powerhouse you can be from the previous titles, only this time, not for all situations, unless you adapt your gear.

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It’s an interesting concept that I can totally dig. However, I don’t think it’s fully realized yet. You can carry up to three primary weapons and one sidearm, this pretty much allows you to cover all grounds when it comes to having the right weapon for the right enemy type. That only leaves armor. But, since you can still switch to any of your acquired gear on the fly, it sorta defeats the purpose of making you commit to certain loadouts. You’re still pretty much a Master of All Trades, just with the extra step of having to switchgear from a menu every once in a while. Now if you’re into that sort of thing, then this is a plus. It personally doesn’t bother me either and equipping gearsets to suit my ever-changing playstyle is pretty fun. But yeah, it’s kind of pointless outside adding some extra layer of metagame to help keep things fresh.

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But speaking of keeping things fresh, you’ll be able to craft resolver and supremo gear. Supremos are basically your character’s Super. There are several kinds of upgradeable supremos ranging from offensive and defensive, to utility and support effects. Resolver weapons, on the other hand, are special weapons outside your conventional weapon types. From a flamethrower that runs on valuable Gas to a modified crossbow that fires long poles that can impale enemies. These are lots of fun to use and quite expensive to craft, making you really want to take out anti-aircraft camps for some depleted uranium.

There’s also a slightly bigger push for co-op this time around. Since some of the resources can be acquired more easily through special operations. These are special missions set in unique new areas. These can be played solo but grants more quest rewards when played with a friend (not to mention a lot more fun). Two are available to start with a couple more to be added on a later update. You also will be able to send allied guerilla leaders on their own missions. These missions will often have several levels to complete, with up to 3 ways to tackle each level. These can vary in cost and success rate. You’ll need to manage your resources and pick choices that least impact your reserves.

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You’ll also find a few “Amigos” which are NPC companions that’ll fight with you while free-roaming. These are predominantly animals from crocodiles to roosters that you can give simple commands to and have certain unique effects (ie Chorizo the handicapped dog can distract enemies with his incredible cuteness). Unfortunately, as a predominantly stealth player, I end up dismissing these Amigos because they seem to sometimes reveal themselves and ruin my infiltration. Outside of stealth, however, they’re pretty fun to fight with, not to mention adorable.

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There’s quite a bit to do in Far Cry 6 and they’re varied enough to stay fun for a while. However the world is quite massive, there are about 5 different areas in the game with 3 of them being massive main areas for campaigning. If you’re new to Far Cry, you’ll enjoy a majority of your time doing all these. For some of us, we’ve seen variations of these before and some could get a bit boring. What keeps it interesting is the anticipation of what rewards you’ll get, as there is quite a bit of loot to collect, and it’s fun to look forward to finding out what’s the next best loot. Thankfully gear is scattered pretty well so you’re less likely to find all the best gear too early into the game. There’s a cockfighting minigame which is basically Chekken (Chicken Tekken) which was hilariously fun, but unfortunately more like a one-off gag and a missed opportunity. I don’t know why they passed up on making it like Pokemon where you could challenge several NPC’s to a cockfight and earn their rooster as a reward for beating them. Instead, you just boringly find them caged up as collectibles in the open world, like everything else.

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Outside all of the civilian vehicles, you can collect, you also have access to up to 4 customizable vehicles. You can equip them with upgradeable defensive and offensive mods and trick them out with a new paint job and cosmetic trinkets for your dashboard. But more interestingly is the addition of horses, which is convenient for their maneuverability, considering many of the game’s paths are actually offroad.

But perhaps my absolute favorite transportation in Far Cry is the fact that you can fast travel to any safe house via Air Drop. Meaning instead of dropping you from the ground, you can spawn several feet in the air. From here you can parachute or wingsuit your way around wherever it is you need to go. Since unlocking the feature, I found myself using this quite a lot to get to my objective. Quick and super fun.

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¡Viva la Libertad! 

Yara being described as a paradise island is quite literal. The overall theme of the map goes back to its tropical roots and boy does it feel good to explore. Each of the 5 different biomes manages to be unique without losing the tropical vibes. literally, every inch of the game is fun to explore, even at sea, as FC6 has some incredibly great-looking water effects, too.

There’s enough visual variety here for more than one game, and being such a visually impressive sandbox makes some of the more repetitive activities worthwhile just for the thrill of exploration alone. Melee kill animations are pretty lackluster though, and Dani’s movements are all pretty repetitive and boring to watch. Yara is also less interesting at night, and the lack of time-of-day control feels almost dated.

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Reviewed on the PS5, the console version lacks any kind of graphic settings outside of HDR control. There is no performance or fidelity option, which I think is a good move provided your game plays great, which is the case for FC6. The game runs at a crisp 4k resolution at what feels like a smooth 60fps. I did experience one instance of screen tearing but it never happened again, and it also only occurred well into 3 hours of playing.

Verdict

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I wouldn’t rank Antón Castillo as the series’ best villain yet, but Giancarlo Esposito’s performance was still a genuine treat. The rest of the cast was surprisingly just as good, making for quite an entertaining main storyline. Though the open-world activities didn’t innovate much from previous iterations, the gameplay experience was loads of fun throughout, thanks in part to some subtle albeit welcome changes that refreshes the core Far Cry experience.

Far Cry 6 is a worthwhile buy for those looking for a frantic first-person shooter with hundreds of hours’ worth of mayhem in a sprawling open-world sandbox with a good story to boot. And when it works, co-op is pretty fun, too.


Dian Raval

 
Dian is a writer for Flipgeeks who, in his spare time, stares at a wall in his basement. If you'd like to discuss music, video games, or the infinite wisdom of concrete, follow him on twitter @iburnandfume or subscribe to his YouTube channel @iburnandfume. He's pretty much iburnandfume in everything. Apparently he... burns and fumes.


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